Search results : 501

On 30 January 2020, the Rechtbank Midden-Nederland (Midden-Nederland District Court) delivered an important judgment, refusing to order the removal or rectification of an investigative TV programme broadcast by a Dutch public broadcaster. The litigation received a great deal of coverage in Dutch media, and the judgment set out the principles the Court will apply when determining whether there is a sufficient factual basis for investigative reporting.   The case arose on 26 November 2019, when the Dutch public broadcaster AVROTROS broadcast an episode of its long-running Opgelicht investigative...

On 24 January 2020, the District Court of Noord-Nederlands announced that the Dutch broadcaster RTL was no longer permitted to make recordings in the court during an ongoing high-profile case. Furthermore, the court announced that RTL, with the exception of its news programme RTL Nieuws, was prohibited from making recordings for other broadcasters in the court for the next three months. The court stated that the measures were being imposed due to a programme broadcast by RTL on 21 January 2020.     The issue arose in a case currently before the court, known as the Ruinerwold case,...

In its judgment of 20 December 2019, the Rechtbank Amsterdam (District Court of Amsterdam) delivered an important judgment on tabloid journalism in the Netherlands, ruling that media outlet TMG did not have to remove a sensationalist, online article on a well-known singer’s alleged adultery with a television host – the claimant – in 2014. The district court held that the media outlet’s freedom of expression, as guaranteed by Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), outweighed the television host’s right to privacy, as enshrined in Article 8 ECHR...

On 19 December 2019, the Dutch Minister of Education, Culture and Science wrote a letter to parliament regarding a proposed law that would change the applicable rules for regional public broadcasters. In the letter, the minister declared that he would not submit the legislative proposal to the Dutch Parliament. In 2016, the Dutch Media Act was changed in order to create a body representing regional public broadcasters, referred to as Regionale Publieke Omroep (RPO) (see IRIS 2016-5/25). The RPO is the umbrella organisation for the 13 regional public broadcasters and is intended to function as...

In its judgment of 17 December 2019, the Court of Appeal of Arnhem-Leeuwarden (Gerechtshof Arnhem-Leeuwarden) delivered an important judgment on #MeToo reporting in the Netherlands, ruling that Dutch news outlet NRC could name an individual in an investigative report on that individual’s alleged “sexually transgressive behaviour” (seksueel grensoverschrijdend gedrag). The Court of Appeal held that given the circumstances in question, the news outlet’s freedom of expression, as guaranteed by Article 10 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR), outweighed the individual’s...